This device relates to fishing, specifically to the type of fishing called jigging and the use of wind currents to effect jigging in the device.
Jigging is the practice of moving a lure or bait up and down in the water for periods of time at different depths to locate, attract, and capture fish. This particular method of fishing is popular during ice fishing, where the angler stands directly above the hole in the ice and moves the bait up and down. This invention goes beyond simple lift and drop jigging to effect more activity in the attached lure or bait. Attempts have been made to transfer this motion to machines or devices so that several lines can be jigged at the same time while the angler watches. Many approaches have been used but the ones of particular interest have attempted to use the wind to cause jigging.
With U.S. Pat. No. 2,663,962, Dec. 29, 1953, King used a teetering arm balanced in the middle by a pin and weight acting as a pendulum, with a fish line on one end and a wind vane on the other that was activated by cross winds. This device was based on one of the six simple machines, the class I lever. All class I levers have a bar that is free to turn about a fixed point called a fulcrum, which may be placed at any point between the effort arm (wind vane) and the load (fish line and hook). A number of devices subsequently appeared that were very similar in structural appearance and function. They are represented by:
U.S. Pat. No. 2,732,649, Jan. 31, 1956, Tuttle PA0 U.S. Pat. No. 2.934.849, May 3, 1960, Kampa PA0 U.S. Pat. No. 2,967,640, Mar. 28, 1961, Sensenbrenner PA0 U.S. Pat. No. 4,373,287, Feb. 15, 1983, Grahl PA0 U.S. Pat. No. 4,567,686, Feb. 4, 1986, Akom PA0 U.S. Pat. No. 4,642,930, Feb. 17, 1987, Graf
Their differences were not significantly great but involved signaling devices, hooking devices, line spools, wind vanes, and balancing weights. They, however, all similarly used the class I lever approach, utilizing a pivoting straight bar (teeter totter design), not much different than what King first suggested in U.S. Pat. No. 2,663,692 in 1953. They all followed the original "tip-up" design suggested by Cedric Wells in Popular Mechanics, February 1939. By using a straight bar, all the devices needed a substantial foundation from which they could pivot. The foundations or bases had to have designs that allowed them to fold up so they could be transported. This resulted in extra time in setting up when starting to fish and breaking down when finished fishing. Five or six of these devices could add considerable weight and space when transporting them to the fishing site.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,033,062, Jul. 5, 1977, Denecky, presented a slightly different look in his device, having a wind vane facing into the wind, on the same side of the fulcrum as the fishing line, and a special fish hooking device. The class I lever was again used in this device.
All the devices cited use a straight (in a line) lever, with the foundation or base as the fulcrum. No attempts at anything other than the straight class I lever approach have been attempted. None could be adapted to fit a bucket as a foundation due to the straight teetering bar, as the bucket would be in the way. They also try to incorporate signaling devices, line spools, and hooking devices, that could interfere with the main function of the device, to oscillate or jig the bait. They can be hard to balance with some of these things actually mounted on the arm itself. None of these devices utilize designs that would allow an angler to use a separate fishing rod where the fishing line can immediately be removed from the device upon hooking the fish and the fish then played and landed in a normal fashion on the fishing rod. When the fishing line cannot be removed from the device, it severely limits the angler's ability to land an extremely large fish as the angler would be disadvantaged without a rod that bends and the use of a drag on a fishing reel, resulting in the large fish breaking the line.
The prior art utilize simple two dimensional up and down jigging, failing to capture the third dimension. The present invention captures all three dimensions.